Boeing is using Interpublic's Powell Tate unit to build PR support for President Bush's missile defense system. Bush's request for $8.3 billion for missile defense was expected to be sliced due to the vanishing surplus, but now has gotten new life in aftermath of last week's terror attacks. This contradicts Kevin McCauley's prediction in last week's O'Dwyer's PR Daily. McCauley wrote that the terrorist attacks "killed Bush's missile defense program.

Smithsonian Institution Secretary Lawrence Small has embraced commercialism and shifted the Smithsonian's mission from "the increase and diffusion of knowledge" to acting as an auxilliary megaphone for corporate marketing and public relations efforts. "Mr. Small, a mortgage banker by profession, is much better suited to the promotion of SUVs or hamburgers than to the management of our nation's most important cultural institution. Mr.

As might be expected, last week's terrorist bombings have energized some of the most extremist and intolerant segments of American society.